Gavin Kovite – författare

War of the Encyclopaedists is Christopher Robinson and Gavin Kovite's dazzling literary debut.On a summer night in an arty enclave of Seattle, friends Mickey Montauk and Halifax Corderoy throw one last blowout party before their lives part ways. They had planned to move together to Boston, but global events have intervened: Montauk has just learnt that his National Guard unit will deploy to Baghdad at the end of the summer. And Corderoy is faced with a moral dilemma: his girlfriend Mani has just been evicted and he must decide whether or not to abandon her when she needs him most. The year that follows will transform them all.'This book has sweep and heart and humour. It captures coming of age during foreign wars and domestic malaise, and it does so with electrifying insight' Mary Karr, author of The Liars' Club'As bizarre, hilarious and devastating as the past decade . . . Simultaneously a coming-of-age story, a war story, and a story of the disaffected millennial generation for whom the war hardly happened at all' Phil Klay, author of Redeployment

“A captivating coming-of-age novel that is, by turns, funny and sad and elegiac” (Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times) about two best friends as their post-grad lives diverge—one into liberal academia, the other into the American military occupation of Iraq.On a summer night in 2004, prepping for another blowout party in the arty Seattle enclave of Capitol Hill, Mickey Montauk has just learned that he won’t be joining his best friend, Halifax Corderoy, for grad school in Boston. Global events have intervened, and Mickey’s National Guard unit will soon deploy to Baghdad. But before he can make this stunning revelation, events spiral beyond their control. In the bleary-eyed dawn, Mickey and Hal glimpse their radically altered future, the start of a year that will transform them all. Months later, Mickey struggles to lead his platoon safely through an increasingly violent and confusing war. In Boston, Hal finds himself unable to play the game of intellectual one-upmanship with the ease of his new classmates. When Hal’s new roommate, Tricia, and ex-girlfriend, Mani, come between the best friends, Hal and Mickey find that cool irony and youthful self-regard cannot insulate them from the damages of love and conflict and the messiness of living. As Mickey and Hal’s lives move further away from their shared dream, they keep in touch by editing a Wikipedia article about themselves: absurd and hilarious updates that morph and deepen throughout the year, culminating in a document that is both devastatingly tragic and profoundly poetic. “One of the most revealing novels yet about the millennial generation” (Esquire), War of the Encyclopaedists beats with the energetic pulse of idealistic youth on the threshold of adult reality. It is the vital, urgent, and utterly absorbing lament of searching for meaning and hope in a fractured world: “A love story, a war story, and also a generational one, about coming of age in the time of Wikipedia and YouTube…darkly funny and absurd and terrifying at the same time” (The Wall Street Journal).

A smart, fresh tale for the millenial generation - about going to university, going to war, and growing upIt was the Friday before Independence Day and the twentysomethings of early-millennium Seattle were celebrating alcohol and freedom as they had done every Friday since time immemorial. On Fifteenth Avenue, in Capitol Hill, Mickey Montauk and Halifax Corderoy were hosting their sixth event as "The Encyclopaedists"...Meet Mickey Montauk and Halifax Corderoy. On their own, they are two kids kicking around town after the end of high school, getting drunk and high and waiting for life to begin. Together, for one glorious, immortal summer, they are the Encyclopaedists: infamous hosts of the wildest parties Seattle has ever seen. But what will happen when the summer ends?Autumn comes and life intervenes: the two friends find themselves flung worlds apart. Mickey's National Guard unit are deployed abroad and Hal must take up his place at college in Boston. All that remains of their old life is their last great in-joke, a nonsensical Wikipedia entry about themselves, The Encyclopaedists.Out in Baghdad, Mickey finds himself in the middle of a brutal war that has no place for laid-back, sensitive youths or ironic webpages. Back in the US, Hal is marooned in the anonymity of the freshman college experience, rapidly realising the parties just aren't the same without his old partner in crime. And on top of all the upheavel there is Mani, Hal's bewitching, suddenly-homeless sort-of girlfriend...In their first year as adults, these three characters will be transformed into people they would never have recognised - and might not even have let through the door - on the eve of Independence Day on Capitol Hill.Razor-sharp, urgent and authentic, this is the story of a generation at a crossroads, staring down the barrel of adulthood and trying desperately not to blink. 'Extraordinary... An extremely moving story that feels as if it has something urgent to say about how we live now' Sunday Times